Like many people, I use lists to try to keep myself oriented. I’ve been trying a host of list keeping and time tracking tools in the past couple of months, and I’ve landed on my current favorite: Visual Mind.

VM works like an outliner. I create top branches to include everything that I’m trying to keep on my radar on any given day. As I work on a particular project, I can expand the branches of a particular project. Since I use VM for project mangement, system analysis, and illustration anyway, I can integrate the latter functions into my todo list if I need to.

VM also allows you to post maps to the web. These run in a java runtime application, so anyone with a modern web browser can take a look at your masterpiece.

Alternatives

Web Based Tools

Todoist does a nice hierarchy, that allows you to snap open a single project while keeping the other projects visible but closed. Free.

Ta-da Lists, from the people who brought us Basecamp. Free

Nozbe is a “strict” implementation of the Getting Things Done methodology. It allows you to view your items by project, “next action”, and context. Free for 6 projects, $4.95/month for 30 projects.

Applications

TraxTime – still the best for time tracking. Allows you to track time by projects and it creates a nice set of reports at the end of the month or reporting period which I use as the basis for invoicing. I have this running on my laptop all the time. (In fact, I think this is the main reason for keeping the laptop running.) $39.95 for the single user version, a networkable multi-user version is also available, but it isn’t a web-based application, so, as far as I know it will only work when all the users are on the LAN.

My Timeboxing uses the Timebox model. More about this in last month’s archive.

So, what I think I really want, is the visual appeal of Visual Mind, the ability to track time as well as TraxTime, with a timeboxing option from My Timeboxing, with the simplicity and zero cost of Todoist, or Ta-da Lists. In the meantime, I’ll continue using VM with help from a couple Yahoo widgets, a countdown timer, and a counting ‘up’ timer, as well as the lovely station clock.

Welcome to Tech for Non-Profits, the unplugged version of Microdesign Consulting. Part lab-notebook, part brain-extension, it is a repository for new and half-baked ideas that we run across as we provide software and database development, network support, and R&D for a growing list of clients in education, health care and non-profit organizations.

Ongoing projects this month include finishing up a couple Access 2007 applications and working on another round of grant funding for EPSCoR and SBIR.

Regular features include Tech Friday, which may include code(!), our (mostly) annotated VoIP resource guide, Stuff That Works for hardware and software items that have passed the Five Minute Test, and Chron This Week, which is synopsis of technology articles of interest in the Chronicle of Philanthropy. Topics on grantwritng and fundraising appear as we seem to have one or more grant application in progress most of the time.

Comments and suggestions are welcome. They are moderated, so they may not show up immediatly.

Over at the Dell Ideastorm they have created a “suggestion box” for Dell customers. There aren’t a lot of surprises. A lot of the comments have to do with the hassle of dealing with Dell. Examples:

1. Crappy tech support, especially when outsourced to India via lousy VoIP connections
2. Stupid pre-installed software that people remove anyway
3. Lack of Linux and Open Office options
4. Confusing product line, and lack of customer focus
5. Better laptop design and quality

Dell stock has been drifting south for months, and is now down around 24 after peaking around 42 at the beginning of 2005. There has been a management team shakeup, and Michael Dell has resumed the CEO post in an attempt to get them back on track. I think this site is a great idea, and not just for Dell….maybe other hardware vendors should take a look and see what computer purchasers are dying for when they cut the purchase orders in 2007.

This commentary was just cited by the Non-Profit Quartely, and was previously published in the Chronicle of Philanthropy.

The March Linux Journal is chock full of good things.

This issue is a virtual encyclopedia of knowledge about VoIP, especially Asterisk. Travel a lot? We show you how to set up Asterisk to know where you are and handle incoming calls differently depending whether you’re likely to be asleep. We demonstrate how Trixbox makes it easier than ever to create a full-featured PBX. What do you do if your NAT-based home network is interfering with your VoIP communications? We have the answers. We also show you how to hook into Asterisk with Ruby, and even how to build your own embedded Asterisk system.

Marcel Gagne’s column is all about Ekiga, the former GnomeMeeting, which is the open source videoconferencing application. And Doc Searls’ column has a discussion of Do It Yourself Internet Infrastructure which contains a great Q&A about fiber to the home, municipal internet connections and the relationship between the telephone and cable companies and our connections to the internet. Quotes:

Q: How have the carriers crippled our Internet Service?

A: The Internet was designed originally as a symmetrical system. That means the “upstream” and “downstream” speeds should be the same. That’s the kind of Internet connectivity we find in universities and inside large companies. But it’s not what the telephone and cable companies provide to our homes and small businesses. What we get is asymmetrical—much higher downstream than upstream….

… The problem is, these asymmetrical lines relegate everybody to a consumer role and prevent us from becoming producers as well. The limitation is compounded by what are called “port blockages”. This is where our phone or cable company prevents us from setting up our own Web server or running our own mail server. Again, they have some good reasons for blocking the ports on our computers that those services could run on. Spammers, for example, can take advantage of open mail server ports on our computers. But these port blockages also prevent all types of uses, including the ability to set up home businesses of many kinds.

So, instead of, say, offering services that aid in the development of small and home businesses, the carriers just shut off possibilities to avoid hassles that might distract focus from their core phone and cable TV businesses.

Unfortunately, this very important article is behind the subscription barrier, but if there is anything to encourage you buy a subscription to LJ, this article should be a good candidate.

Ok…so it took my twenty minutes to find where you can assign keyboard shortcuts to your own macros, in Word 2007.
1. Click the “round circle thing” in the upper left hand corner

2. Click “Word Options”
3. Click the “Customize” button at the bottom of that screen

4. Click Keyboard Shortcuts
This brings up the “customize keyboard” dialog box, similar to Word 2003.

Recently out in beta, Nozbe is an application which helps you manage your life using the Getting Things Done methodology. The developer seems to be quite responsive, he has already added a couple of features suggested by the testers.

One thing we like to do around here is look at the possibility of replacing local infrastructure with online infrastructure. Can Google Docs and Spreadsheets replace Word and Excel? Can Google Mail replace OutLook? Can applications from 37Signals replace your to-do list (OutLook), your calendar, and your project manager? In our case the intial motivation has been to allow real-time collaboration with others, but what about having all of your office applications on-line? The Coghead blog has an entry about going Bedouin, that describes this approach. Not incidentally, the Cogheads are marketing a framework that allow users to build online applications that would allow you to go Bedouin. I particularly like the image of roving bands carrying laptops and cell phones…

I’m interested in something more radical. By focusing almost exclusively on service-based infrastructure options, a business could operate as a sort of neo-Bedouin clan – with workers as a roaming nomadic tribe carrying laptops & cell phones and able to set up shop wherever there is an Internet connection, chairs, tables, and sources of caffeine.

In any business, infrastructure needs will arise that are best served by “in-house” approaches. What makes a neo-Bedouin approach different than traditional approaches is the commitment to seeking service-based alternatives to building or acquiring infrastructure that must be managed, moved or otherwise dealt with. Companies that make such a commitment can focus more of their energy and their resources on building products, supporting customers, or other core business needs.

The primary reason software businesses don’t “go Bedouin” is because they think they don’t have to. Fatness is easy. Executives like to construct monuments. Managers like to build empires. Engineers and IT professionals like to buy and play with technology. People like to settle in and nest. As swifter, more nimble competitors enter the software technology marketplace in greater numbers; however, companies will pay an increased penalty for their fatness. Like many resource rich kingdoms that faced the Mongols, recognition of the threat may come too late.

My week is not starting out well. I’m using QuickBooks 2007 Pro. I have used this essential program for years to run my business, and regularly recommend it to clients. I was recently forced to upgrade to 2007 for $200, because the payroll service is not supported on my current version, QB 2004.

QuickBooks is morphing from year to year into something like a huge advertisement for a bunch of online “value-added services” which cost extra.

I create an invoice, and print the invoice directly. Now I want to print an envelope for the invoice. There is a menu selection for this, and what it does then is make a call to Microsoft Word, and use Word’s envelope printing function. In Word 2007, there is no PostNet bar code included on the envelope.

Questions:
1. If Quickbooks can program umpteen irrelevant options, like “Google Ads” into their 2007 version, why can they spend a few cycles programming a working envelope printing function? An undergraduate student could do this in a day.

2. Why is my “30 day free call-back” service outsourced via an almost un-listenable VoIP service, to an obviously non-native speaker, who blindly follows a lame script, and wants to spend most of their time “verifying my information” even though I just spent five minutes typing it all in on the internet request form not ten minutes before the call?

3. What if I didn’t have Microsoft Word?

This is one of those critical moments. After using a trusted program/service/doctor/consultant/whatever/ for years, and never considering an alternative, never worrying about the cost, there sometimes comes a time when you are brought up short, and think to yourself, “Maybe there is an alternative”. And you start looking. And you never trust your current provider quite as much.

This works both ways, of course. As a technology consultant, I must constantly work to retain the trust of my clients as well. Happily, many have maintained long-term relationships.

Here is an interesting approach that enhances the usual tasklist and calendar program to provide some help in actually managing and allocating your time. From the web site description:

My Timeboxing is a timeboxing application which allows you to allocate certain amount of time to each of your tasks, and then track your progress. It is very user friendly and easy to use.

Timeboxing is a new way how to rapidly increase your productivity and reduce time wasting. Simple schedule how long you would like to work on certain projects or tasks and then track your progress. You will be finally able to accomplish your plans.

You probably know that if you just want to do some certain actions, you will often not be able to do them all as planned, due to before unknown circumstances. Timeboxing is the solution. Just commit yourself to work on something for certain amount of time. The more you do – the better!

What’s interesting to me about this is that you can plot the tasks of your whole day out, with time estimates, and get a running total of the number of tasks you have accomplished, how many need to be completed, the amount of time you have worked on the tasks and how much time you have left, and your percentage of your estimating efficiency.

Here is another discussion about timeboxing from Dave Cheong. You don’t need software to do it!